History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, Part 132

Author: Bean, Theodore Weber, 1833-1891, [from old catalog] ed; Buck, William J. (William Joseph), 1825-1901
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, Everts & Peck
Number of Pages: 1534

USA > Pennsylvania > Montgomery County > History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania > Part 132

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

566

HISTORY OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY.

built within what is now Montgomery County. Early accounts locate it " on the Perkiomen, thirteen miles (above) northeast of Pottstown. No remains of it are now visible." Subsequently new works were erected there, and operated by Thomas Potts and his sous. In 1748 David took title to one-sixth interest. The following data of this furnace show the extent of its production from 1738 to 1741 :

" Account, Pig Metal and other castings made at Mount Pleasant Furnace During the Following Blasts, viz. :

1. c. it.

First blast, commencing October 12, 1738 ; hove off Tweeember li.

Made the said blast. Pigs.

Country castings

Forge dittu

Second blast, commencing March 14, 1738-39 ; hove off July 12, 1739.

Made the said blast. Pigs, July

173

Forge castings

174 5 1

Third blast, commenring October 22, 1739 ; blowed ont December 14, 1739

Made the said blast. Pigs.

1 24

Country castings

Forge ditto

1 19

A short blast, from August 28 to September 7,

1739, included in ye above

99 11 .

Fourth blast, commencing March 3, 1739-40 ; blowed ont May 26, 174.1.

Made the said blast. Pigs

153

Country castings

Forge ditto .

1-1

To 6247 Shot of 18 1b each W4 50 3 3 26

To 1420 Shot of 12 1b each Wd 7 12 0 16

78 19 2 6 @ £20 . 1579 11 0

To 1522 Shot of 9 lb each Wd 6 2 1 6 @ $22. 134 10 10

To 3153 Shot of 8 lb each Wd 11 5 0 24 @@ $23 259 0 8

To 1472 Shot of 6 1b each Wd 3 18 3 22 @ £24. 94 14 7 To 3006 Shot of 4 lb cach. Wd 5 7 9 12 @ ť25 134 4 3

To Clock Weights Wd 4 11 @@ £25 113 15 0

2:115 16 4

1 In April, 1776, Benjamin Loxley made proposals for casting brass eight-inch mortars, howitzers, canoon and shells for Congress or the Committee of Safety. Some of the brass guns of Major Loxley were tested by Daniel Joy of the Reading Furnace, who was also engaged in casting and boring iron nine-pounders at the rate of one daily, to be followed by another of larger size. The iron pieces appear to have stood the proof better than the brass. Joy, in the same year proposed a method of constructing fire-rafts for the defense of the Delaware. Congress in the following April called upon all the Legislatures or executives of the States to exempt from military duty all persons employed in casting shot and manufacturing military stores of any kind ; and in June the Board of War recommended that eleven men employed by Mark Bird in the cadoon fonndry and nail-works in Berks County, carried on by him for the use of the United States be discharged from the militia, into which they were drafted. During the same month James Byers who had cast brass guns for the government was requested to hohl himself in readi- ness to remove his apparatus and utensils at a moment's warning on the ap- proach of the British. Morgan Busteed, Samuel Potts, and Thomas Rutter each nudle proposals to cast cannoo in the course of the year. There was at this time a cannon foundry in Southwark, but we do not know who owned it. In August, 1776, the Board of War informed President Wharton that the furnace for casting cannon stood idle for want of copper, and requested permission to use a load which had been sent from French ('reek, Int was claimed by the State. There was also some dispute respecting the furnace as well as the mat rial. - Bishop, " History of American Manufactures."

* l'otts Memorin'.

Sixth blast, commencing May 18, 1741 ; blowed 1. c. 4. lb.

ont July 20.

Made the said blast. l'igs 60

Country castings

Forge dlittu 1

63 6 16 "

These early furnaces and forges were not only fruit- ful sources of commercial value in time of peace, but they became indispensable factors in war. The mother- country was sensitive of the fact, and, therefore, in her prohibitory laws, she aimed not only to augment her home strength but to cripple the rising colonies, and retard their pretensions in seeking separation and independence. Early in the Revolution Samuel Potts and Thomas Rutter contraeted with the Council of Safety to furnish eannon and munitions of war.1 The following certified account is found among many others similar in character referred to in the colonial records. The clock-weights mentioned are those made in obedience to a general order issued, iron clock-weights to be substituted for the leaden ones in use, the government requiring the surrender of all lead in domestic use for bullets.

The Council of Safety in Account with Rutter & Potts.

DR.

1776. t. c. q. 1b. £. & d. To 151 shot of 32 lb each Wd 2 3 0 16 T. c. q. ]b. £ s. d.

To 573 Shot of 24 lb each Wd 6 2 3 4

To 1260 Shot of 22 1b each Wd 12 7 2

Made the said blast. Pigs

8€

Country castings

Forge ditto

3 31%

Fifth blast, commencing Angust 28, 1740: blowed out November 16.

162

Warwick in the summer of 1868, the writer saw at Coventry one of these original stoves. In an inventory, made in 1796, of the personal estate of Colonel Thomas Potts' willow, the step-daughter of Robert Grace, one room in her house was designated as the "stove- room." I had hoped to find this parlor, with the Franklin stove sur- rounded by the ancient tiles, remembered by her children, but they had all been taken away when the house was refitted and one part rebuilt, in 1803, but I was able to trace the stove to a honse about half-a-mile distant, where I saw it. The pattern was of more antiquated design than that given by Lossing as probably an original, and 80 clumsy and massive in structure that no doubt remained in my mind that the great philosopher had sat beside its hearth admiring his new invention. The words " Warwick Furnace " were cast on the front in letters two inches long, but I searched in vain for any date. On my return to Warwick, I inquired of Mr. Nathaniel Potts (the present owner) for the old modris, but he told me that they had all been destroyed long ago, and added that he remembered two of the old stoves in the Warwick mansion which were taken out more than fifty years since and melted up, giving place to more modern improvements. As the same fate seems to have overtaken all the other old Franklin stoves in the neighborhood, I eu- deavonred to persuade the owner of this one to give it to the Pennsyl- vania Historical Society as a relic, but did not succeed. Franklin often visited his friend Robert Grace at Coventry, and it is quite probable that he superintended the setting of this one himself. Having traced its bis- tory so clearly as an original Franklin stove, I hope it may be carefully preserved .*

= 1

567

MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES.

₺. s. d.

To 7584 halfpound Sbot Wd 379216 la &d 126 8 0

To 952]b Grape Shot @ Si . .

31 14 8

To Cash Id Wm. Hutchinson for hanl 9 Powder

10 0

T. c. q. 1b.

To 203 Shot of 22 Jb each W4 1 19 2 18 (@ £20. 39 13 7

To 282 Shot of 4 lb rach W4 0 10 0 8 @ £25.

12 12 0

To 374 Shot of 6 1b each Wd 1 0 0 1 @@ €24

24 1 0

To 747 Shot of 3 lb each W4 1 0 0 1 @ £2G. 26 0 3

2576 15 IO

Certified 26th October, 1776.

ROBERT TOWERS.

To Balance on Cannon Acct 379 5 9

2056 1 7

C'r.

£ 8. d.

By 13lb Powder

By Cash Paid .

1500 0 0

"Inthe act of Assembly I passed by Massachusettsin 1727, regulating the prices of merchantable articles, the rate of bar-iron is put down at 488. ; cast-iron pots and kettles, 488. a hundred. In 1777 another aet passed by the same State places good refined iron at 50s. per cwt. and Bloomery iron at 30s. per ewt. at the place of manufactory." It has been some trouble to look out from the original papers the prices of iron at the Potts furnaces and forges during the period covered by the figures given as the prevailing prices in Massa- chusetts. From 1731 to 1781 they were, however, as follows :

In 1731, pig-iron was sold at Colebrookdale Furnace in large quantities at £5 10s.2 per ton.

In 1765 pig-iron brought £7 per ton.

In 1767 pig-iron brought Es 10s per toll.

In 1774 pig-iron brought £7 5s per ton. This was a quantity of 725 tons.

In 1775 pig-iron brought €7 5y per ton.

In 1776 pig-iron brought £7 58 per ton.

In 1781 pig-iron brought €10 per ton. For 100 tons, hard money to be paid for it.

In 1784 pig-iron brought £11 10s per ton.

In 1762 bur-iron brought £34 per ton.

In 1781 twenty-five toons bar-iron well drawn for slitting purposes, £35 per ton in hard money.

For castings, which seem to have been divided into two kinds,-namely, forge castings and country east- ings,-the last including all articles of domestic use, the following prices are noted :

In 1774 anvil and forge castings brought 14s per bundredwright.

In 1774 a Dutch oven brought 15s.

In 1774 two large Moravian stoves brought £9 apiece.

In 1779 a ton of pots brought £700.

In 1779 five tons of stoves brought £400 per ton.

In 1785 Franklin stoves sold at retail brought £5 108 apiece.

In 1785 ten-plate stoves brought £10 apiece.

In 1785 large six-plate stoves brought £7 apiece.

In 1785 small six-plate stoves brought £5 10s.

Iron works were established at Valley Forge as early as 1750. These works were purchased by John Potts in 1757 and by him improved. This forge was known previous to the Potts purchase by the name of "Mount Joy," and so appears in the old title papers of that locality. In 1765 John Potts conveyed

1 "Felt s Massachusetts Currency."

2 Pennsylvania currency, a pound being equal to $2.66.

the works to his two sons, Samuel and John. From an inventory made by them, when they came into possession, the personal property 'at the forge was valued at £1214 6s. 9d. John, in 1768, sold his. interest to his brother Joseph, who with David Potts, another brother, and Thomas Hockly, a cousin, operated this forge, under the firm-name of Potts, Hoekly & Potts, up to and during the Revolution. This forge was supplied with pig-iron from the War- wiek Furnace. When converted into wrought-iron, for domestie use, it was transported to Philadelphia in wagons. These teams, of six horses each, were in constant use in hanling wood and charcoal to supply this forge and in transporting the product to market. The greatest amount of pig-iron used in one year is reported to be fifty-one tons. This capacity appears to have been increased under the subsequent manage- ment of Isaac Potts & Co., who, in " 1786, received from the Warwick Furnace eighty-five tons of pig- iron," all which appears to have been manufactured into bar-iron, and sold at prices ranging from twenty-four to thirty pounds per ton. The site of this early forge has been the subject of dispute among local antiquarians, some contending that it was located in Philadelphia (now Montgomery) County, others that it was within the lines of Chester County. The works were burned by the British in the campaign of 1777, and it seems that the adjudication of damages sustained by the owners took place in the courts of Chester County, and this circumstance is relied upon to fix the site of the forge within that county. We think this circumstance has misled the antiquarian. The better opinion seems founded upon the description of the real estate upon which the forge was situated. The dividing line between Philadelphia and Chester County was on the southwest shore-line of the Valley Creek. Mrs. Thomas James Potts says, "The site of this old forge, which was hurned by the British more than two months before the American army encamped there. is now covered by water, and is at the foot of Mount Joy (Mount Joy is on the east shore), and more than a halt-mile above the Valley mill. The new dam, which was built lower down the creek after the Revolution, raised the water-level and covered the foundations. The new works, erected soon after the close of the war, were built near where the present factory stands."

The manufacture of iron and steel has been a lead- ing industry in Pennsylvania since the establishment of the early works herein referred to. Every census, from that of 1790 to 1880, shows the steady and enor- mous increase of the product. The discovery and application of anthracite coal to the manufacture of pig-iron, during the first quarter of the present century, gave a new impetus to the trade.3 Natural re-

8 In 1812 Colonel George Shoemaker, of Pottsville, loaded nine wagons of coal from his mines at Centreville, and with these proceeded to Phila- delphia, hoping to find a market, but the experiener of Philadelphians

568

HISTORY OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY.

sources were never more conveniently located, with ref- erence to the uses mankind has sought to make of them, than in the beds of ore, fields of coal and bodies of fluxing materials, and all on the banks of a water-way upon which to float them to tide-water for distribution. The use of steam and railroads further augmented the product, while the introduction of wrought-iron into the land and naval architecture of peace and war has created a largely increased demand, to supply which Pennsylvanians (enterpris- ing capitalists, inventors and laborers) have always been foremost, in peace and in war. Figures from the census of 1850 and that of 1880 may here be compared with advantage. In 1850 the total value of the annual irou product of the United States was $60,486,153. Pennsylvania's product was valued at $20,650,650, or one-third of the whole amount. In 1880 the total value of the annual iron product of the United States was reported to be $333,840,054. The product of Pennsylvania for the year 1880 was valued at $158,- 033,697, or 46 per cent. of the entire amount. Thus it will be seen that within one generation the annual product of iron has increased 500 per cent. in the United States, yet the increase in Pennsylvania is greater by 200 per cent. than in the whole country, or over 700 per cent. within the period of thirty years. What proportion of capitalized labor engaged in manufacturing in Montgomery County is employed in the production of iron we are unable to state with official exactness. About 33 per cent. of the total value of the annual production of the county's manu- factures, which in 1860 exceeded $20,500,000, is de- rived from iron.1

Present Condition of the Iron Trade. - Following are statistics concerning the iron-works of the county, compiled from the directory published by the Ameri- can Iron and Steel Association :

BLAST FURNACES,-Anvil Furnace, Pottstown Iron Company, Pottstown. One stack, sixty-five by sixteen feet, built in 1867; two iron hot-blast stoves; annual capacity, twenty thousand net tons. (See Rolling- Mills.)

Edgehill Furnace, Joseph E. Thropp & Co., lessees, Edgehill. One stack, sixty-four by sixteen feet, built in 1869-72; two iron hot-blast stoves ; annual capacity, eighteen thousand net tons.

Merion and Elizabeth Furnaces, Merion Iron Company, West Conshohocken. Two stacks: Merion, forty-eight by sixteen feet, built in 1847 and enlarged in 1876; Elizabeth, fifty by sixteen feet, built in 1872;

both stacks remodeled 1883; Merion has three Player ovens and Elizabeth five Ford ovens; combined ca- pacity, about seven hundred net tons per week.

Montgomery Furnace, Montgomery Iron Company, Port Kennedy. One stack, fifty by fourteen feet, built in 1854, remodeled in 1863 and in 1869; three iron hot-blast stoves; two roasters for magnetic ores were added in 1880; annual capacity, twelve thousand five hundred net tons.

Norristown Iron-Works, Norristown, James Hooven & Son. One stack, fifty-five by sixteen feet, built in 1869 and 1871; four eighteen-pipe Player hot-blast stoves ; annual capacity, thirteen thousand five hun- dred net tons.

Plymouth Furnaces, Conshohocken, Plymouth Rolling-Mill Company. Two stacks, fifty-five by fifteen feet and fifty-six by thirteen feet, built in 1845 and 1864 respectively; total annual capacity, with Lucinda Furnace, thirty thousand net tons. (See Rolling-Mills.)

Lucinda Furnace, Norristown, Plymouth Rolling- Mill Company. One stack, forty by thirteen feet ; capacity stated with Plymouth Furnaces.

Warwick Furnace, Warwick Iron Company, Potts- town. One stack, fifty-five by sixteen feet, built in 1875; two iron hot-blast stoves; annual capacity, twenty-four thousand net tons.

William Peun Furnace, William Penn Post-Office, D. O. Hitner. One stack, forty by twelve and a half feet, built in 1854; estimated annual capacity, sixty thousand net tous.

Swede Furnace, Swedelaud, Philadelphia and Reading Coal and Iron Company. One completed stack, seventy-three by fourteen feet; built in 1850, rebuilt in 1881; closed top; annual capacity, fifteen thousand net tons.

ROLLING-MILLS AND STEEL WORKS .- Pencoyd Iron-Works, opposite Manayunk, A. & P. Roberts & Co. Built in 1852; sixteen double paddling furnaces, thirteen heating furnaces, rotary squeezer and five trains of rolls; annnal capacity (iu either iron or steel), thirty thousand net tous.

Conshohocken, Pennsylvania and Corliss Iron- Works, Conshohocken, J. Wood & Brothers. Built in 1832, 1852 aud 1854 respectively, rebuilt in 1882- 83; six double puddling furnaces, seven heating fur- naces and seven twenty-inch trains of rolls; annual capacity (plate and sheet iron), seven thousand net tons.

Ellis & Lossig, Pottstown. Building in 1884 a rolling-mill and nail-factory, to contain fifty nail- machines, two heating and six puddling furnaces, and two trains of rolls.

Glasgow Iron-Works, Glasgow Iron Company, Potts- town. Puddle-mill built in 1874; six double puddling furnaces and one train of muck-rolls ; annual capacity, eight thousand net tons. Plate-mill added in March, 1876; three heating furnaces and one train of rolls; annual capacity (boiler-plate), eight thousand net tons.

with anthracite or stone coal was very unfavorable, and the persistent attempt to impose rocks on them roused their indignation, and Colonel Shoemaker was denounced as a knave and a scoundrel ; he sold two loads and gave the rest away, and some of the purchasers obtained a writ from the anthurities of the city for his arrest as an impostor and a swindler .- Potts' Manual.

NOTE .- Colonel Thomas Potts was versed in metallurgy, and an early purchaser of coal lands in Schuylkill County, Pa.

1 See statistics elsewhere in this chapter.

565

MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES.

Longmead Iron-Works, Conshohocken, Jawood Lu- kens. Built in 1882; five double puddling furnaces and one train of rolls; annual capacity (muck-bar), six thousand six hundred net tous.

Norristown Iron-Works, Norristown, James Hooven & Son. Built in 1846; six double puddling furnaces, three heating furnaces, three trains of rolls and one hammer ; annual capacity (skelp-iron, part of which is made into butt-welded pipes), five thousand net tons. (See Furnaces.)

Plymouth Rolling-Mill Company, Conshohocken. Built in 1881-82. (See Furnaces.)

Pottsgrove Iron-Works, Pottstown, Potts Brothers Iron Company (Limited). Built by Henry l'otts & Co. in 1846 ; six double puddling furnaces, three heating furnaces and two trains of rolls; annual capacity, eight thousand net tons of muek-bar and eight thous- and tons of plate-iron.

Pottstown Iron Company, Pottstown. Built in 1863 and extended in 1867; twenty-nine double puddling furnaces, four Siemens heating furnaces, six forge fires, ninety-five nail-machines, one hammer, three squeezers and seven trains of rolls ; annual capacity, thirty-five thousand net tons of muck-bar, two thou- sand five hundred tons of blooms, twenty-four thou- sand tons of plate-iron and three hundred and sixty thousand kegs of uails. The company is erecting a twenty-four-inch universal mill, with two Siemens heating furnaces. (See Furnaces.)

Schuylkill Iron-Works, Conshohocken, Alan Wood & Co. Built in 1858; fifteen double puddling fur- naces, twelve heating and four grate furnaces, seven trains of rolls, one hammer and two rotary squeezers; annual capacity, fifteen thousand net tons of sheet and plate-iron.

Standard Iron Company (Limited), Norristown. Built by William Schall in 1857 ; eleven double pud- dling furnaces, one rotary squeezer and two trains of puddle-rolls; annual capacity, fourteen thousand net tons of puddled bar.

and importance of this industry in Eastern Pennsyl- vania and the county of Montgomery, a retrospective glance will perhaps give us a keener appreciation of our present advantages and future possibilities. The subject carries us back to a period anterior to the discovery and application of all those scientific instrumentalities and mechanical inventions which have revolutionized the industrial conditions of the world, and affected the social, moral and political status of mankind. When the Jamestown settlers in Virginia began to spin and weave, the latent energy of steam and the subtle agency of the electric fluid were scarcely suspected ; the cotton-gin, power-loom, mule and spinning jenny were unheard of; the uni- versal law of gravitation was unknown and the man who discovered it was unborn. Brief as the inter- vening period now seems, it covers nearly all the great improvements which in the present century are thought most essential and important in the mechanic arts. Those great agencies of mechanical power which have augmented the productive capacity of man aud proportionately increased his comforts, as the use of coal and the blast furnace in the smelting of iron, of explosives and steam in mining, of the fly- ing-shuttle, spinning-frame, power-loom and carding- machines, improvements in the process of bleaching, dyeing, stamping, together with the marvelous dis- coveries in chemistry, all belong to a subsequent period. Cotton, which now employs millions of people and hundreds of millions of capital in its growth and manufacture, was at that period regarded more in the light of a curious exotic than a substance of utility. In short, whatever proficiency may have heen attained in the mechanic arts of civilization in the very early ages, it must be said in truthfulness that their present development from a state of almost barbaric rudeness has been contemporaneous with American history.

It was not till 1810, two hundred years after the first colonization of Virginia, that any systematic manufactures. The few particulars which can now be gathered as to the progress made during those two centuries are scattered through numerous memorials, local histories, records of councils and statutes of as- semblies. These are nevertheless interesting and instructive, as showing from what feeble beginnings our ancestors conducted their infant manufactures

Stony Creek Rolling-Mill, Norristown, J. H. Boone. attempt was made to collect general statistics of Built in 1849 and rebuilt in 1879; four double pud- dling and three heating furnaces, and two trains of rolls ; product, plate-iron.

Miscellaneous Manufactures .- The manufacture of textile fabrics in America appears to have been a necessity recognized by the earliest settlers on the Atlantic coast. Food they could obtain from forest, field and river, but a wholesome pride of through numerous difficulties, and laid the foundation raiment induced efforts to spin and weave and fashion garments for man and woman, with garnishments for the comfort and adornment of the household and home. The first mention in history of American textile manufacture is in 1608, and in connection with the English settlement on the James River. As the mechanie arts in the manufacture of fabrics have contributed greatly to the civilizing power and ele- vation of the masses of mankind in this and other countries, and as we propose to show the magnitude

of their present success. Comparing their condition, even up to the close of the last century, with the state of productive industry in our time, or with the progress made during the last half century, in which many new agencies of great power have added in- tensity to every form of intellectual and material progress, the product makes but a small figure in the annals of history. But it is to be remembered that their advance was at that time equally slow in most parts of the world. Even at the present day, many

570

HISTORY OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY.

countries, which were reckoned elders in the family of nations ere the ring of the axe was heard in the forests of America, are essentially less independent in regard to some products of manufacture than were the American colonies at the period of the Revolu- tion. Equally with the sister arts of agriculture and commerce, our manufactures have, from the first settlement of the country, advanced with the increase in population.

During the colonial period the efforts to establish manufactures of textile fabries were feeble and met with discouragement from the Governors, who pre- sided in the interest of royalty, and who heartily co-operated with the home government in making the settlers dependents for all the products of art and skilled labor. So great was their dependence that Beverley of Virginia, who wrote in 1705, reproaches his countrymen and laments their want of industry and enterprise. He says: "They have their clothing of all sorts from England, as lineu, woolen and silk, hats and leather. Yet flax and hemp grow nowhere in the work better than there. Their sheep yield good increase and bear good fleeces, but they shear them only to cool them. The mulberry-tree, whose leaf is the proper food of the silkworm, grows there like a weed, and silk-worms have been observed to thrive extremely and without any hazard. The very furs that their hats are made of perhaps go first from thence, and most of their hides lie and rot, or are made use of only for covering dry goods in a leaky house. Indeed some few hides with much ado are tanned and made into servants' shoes, but at so caro- less a rate that planters don't care to buy them if they can get others; and sometimes a better manager than ordinary will vouchsafe to make a pair of breeches of a deer-skin. Nay, they are such abomi- nable ill husbands that though their country be over- run with wood, yet they have all their wooden-ware from England,-their cabinets, chairs, tables, stools, chests, boxes, cart-wheels and all other things, even so much as their bowls and birchen brooms-to the eternal reproach of their laziness."

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History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, Part 132

Author: Bean, Theodore Weber, 1833-1891, [from old catalog] ed; Buck, William J. (William Joseph), 1825-1901 Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Philadelphia, Everts & Peck Number of Pages: 1534

Author: Bean, Theodore Weber, 1833-1891, [from old catalog] ed; Buck, William J. (William Joseph), 1825-1901
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, Everts & Peck
Number of Pages: 1534